


petals

by howelldjh



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-01
Updated: 2019-06-01
Packaged: 2020-04-05 20:32:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19047883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howelldjh/pseuds/howelldjh
Summary: Phil’s a part-time barista, part-time flower shop worker, part-time YouTuber, so where better for him to live than a small community filled with students who are also YouTubers and balance jobs on top of school and making videos? He´s quite content living among like-minded people, even though he´s older than most. With the unstableness of jobs and housing, Phil has an extra room in his flat, just in case someone needs it. Dan is a recent uni drop-out who, for the time being, has no idea what he´s doing with his life. With the pain of a breakup, and a little bit of fate, these two are thrown into living with each other





	petals

** 1; galaxy boy  **

I walked around the shop for what was probably the millionth time today. Flowers weren’t as popular as coffee or tea, but I liked the quiet of my weekend job, given the general busyness of my other job at the cafe. There, it was me and about six other people on shift at the same time, serving hundreds of other people. Here, it was just me and Dodie, with maybe a few people walking in and out every now and then. I dragged a finger across the petals of a small black rose, new this week. There were still droplets of water glittering on it, giving it a look similar the a night sky full of stars. I gave a soft smile, then waltzed back up to the counter. Dodie was mumbling lyrics to a song she was writing, something about being sick of losing soulmates. 

“Hey.” I greeted softly. She flinched at the sudden noise.

“Oh, hi Phil.” Dodie grabbed a strand of hair from my forehead and replaced it back into my quiff. I dragged my hand through it just to make sure it still looked okay. The door to the shop opened with a loud ring of the bell. I heard our customer before I saw him.

He was muttering curses under his breath, saying things like, “Like hell she knows how love works. ‘Bisexuality isn’t real, you’re just a fucking fag.’ Fucking bitch. Stupid, motherfucking asshole.” the guy slammed ten pounds onto the counter. “How do I passive aggressively say fuck you with flowers?” he asked.

“Um…” Dodie looked at me for help. I had learned flower meanings from my mum a while ago, so I was better suited for this. Plus, I had more experience with grumpy customers.

“This way sir,” I started, directing the man towards the plants, and I got a good look at him. His hair was dark brown and curly. He was wearing a pink and purple galaxy jumper and ripped black jeans. His eyes were red-rimmed and bloodshot, the colour reminding me of coffee and caramel. He was very nice looking. “Well, first you’re gonna need geraniums,” I pointed to a basket full of pink flowers, and he grabbed a few, “they represent stupidity.” I added, just so he knew I wasn’t bullshitting him and making him a bouquet that said ‘your mum looks like a horse’, though I don’t doubt that he would’ve been okay with that. “And then we need some foxglove, for insincerity.” I pointed to the flowers as I mentioned them, “Meadowsweet, yellow carnations, and orange lilies.” I finished.

“Why specifically yellow and orange?” he asked.

“Oh, um, yellow carnations mean ‘you have disappointed me’ and orange lilies mean hatred.” I explained. The man nodded in interest. “Would you like me to arrange those for you sir?” I gestured to the flowers gripped tightly in his fist.

“Uh, yes, thank you.” We walked back to the counter, Dodie had walked off to somewhere. I tied the bouquet together with a light purple ribbon.

“Would you like a message with this bouquet?” I asked. The man seemed to be busy studying me, and I felt my cheeks go warm.

“Hm? Oh, yes.”

“Address?”

“I think I should at least take you for coffee before you come over to my flat, sir.” the guy smirked.

I snickered, “Uh, no, I meant who is this addressed to?”

“Oh.” a blush flooded his cheeks, “Uh, Mackayla.”

“Is that with m-c or m-a-c?”

“M-a-c.”

“And what’s the message?” I wrote down the name.

“Take this to your mum to figure out the meaning. Fuck you and goodbye.” the man’s tone had a vicious edge to it.

“Break-up?” I dared to ask.

“Yeah,” the man scoffed.

“Well,” I started, finishing the message with an assertive stroke of the pen. “I don’t think they deserved you if you’re sending a bouquet in response of a break-up.” I passed the card for him to sign.

“I’m saying ‘fuck you’ with flowers. Extremely romantic,” he rolled his eyes, writing down ‘d.h’, which I assumed were his initials. I felt a small twinge in my stomach. I wanted to know the name of the mysterious, and attractive, stranger.

I shrugged, “A bouquet’s a bouquet, mate.”

“I guess,” he grabbed the bunch of flowers. I rang him up. I grabbed the pencil from behind my ear, and wrote down my number on the top of his receipt. I tucked it into the bow as he tapped his card.

“Have a nice day, sir,” I gave him a smile.

“Uh, yeah, you too.” he responded, obviously only half paying attention. The man walked off, and I couldn’t help but watch him go. I continued to smile to myself as I put the bill into the register.

“Hey, Phil?” my coworker called from somewhere.

“Uh, yeah?” I was briefly pulled out of my daydreams of the brown-eyed man.

“Whadda ya need?”

“Do you wanna get drinks with me and Hazel? Jack’ll be there too.”

“Uh, not tonight, Dodie,” I politely declined.

“C’mon Phil, hanging out with my friends won’t kill you, I promise.” she grinned.

“I know, and it’d be nice to hang out with Hazel again, but I’m not really the kind of person who goes to clubs, sorry,” I apologized. Dodie looked slightly disappointed, but I knew she understood.

“Alright, but next time we’re doing a nail polish and wine night, I’m dragging you to my flat.”

I smiled, “Wine and nail polish. Okay, sounds fun.” I untied my apron and pulled my jacket back on. “I’ll see you next weekend Dodie!” I headed towards the back door.

“Okay. I might drop into the coffee shop to say hi!” she responded.

“Please do!”

I left the warmth of the greenhouse and stepped into the November cool. A chill ran down my back and I shivered. Sticking my hands in my pockets, I walked down the shortcut back to my flat. The streetlights casted an eerie glow as I trekked down the pavement. This part of London was mostly populated by students, which made me feel safer than my last apartment. I had only gotten out of school a couple years ago, which meant that this community was more around my age, not old and successful business men and women. I felt a lot more at home amongst people who didn’t really have any idea what they were doing yet. Working part-time jobs to keep a flat, and immersing themselves in their hobbies the rest of the time, while also balancing school at the same time. I remembered what that felt like. Everyone had their own thing, sorta. PJ, my neighbour, made short films with his housemate, Chris, who was my age, but was in school a second time for film-making. Tom also made films, but his were more comedy-based, while PJ’s films were more like stories. Jack and Dean also made comedy sketches, but theirs were a bit more PG than Tom’s. Dodie was a singer songwriter, who would be leaving for a tour around the UK in the summer. Louise was older than most of us, and she was basically everyone’s mum. If you needed a place to crash, or just someone to talk to over tea, her flat was always open. I was 99.9% sure that everyone I knew had a key to her apartment, or at least knew where she kept the spare. Hazel was Dodie’s flatmate, and was everyone’s wine aunt. She was also good to talk to, but it was more the random shit you think of at midnight, or maybe 3am tipsy philosophy. And me? I was a YouTuber, like basically everyone else I knew. I used to make films, but I was in a bad mental state while making them and they made me look completely insane. Now, I mostly just told funny anecdotes about the weird stuff that happened to me. It was a fun pastime, but it wasn’t a stable career right now. I walked into the gray building and stepped into the empty lift. My mind drifted back to the man who had came into the shop. He didn’t look much over 16. He was probably around PJ’s age. I wondered if anyone else had met him yet. I passed by PJ and Chris’ flat, and was unsurprised to hear Tom’s voice shouting behind the door, with Jack’s laugh as a response. I unlocked my flat and walked in. Someone had come in and cleaned it up while I was at work, and I allowed myself a small smile. I was the other person who had a spare key to their apartment, and whoever had let themself in to do whatever they needed to had decided to tidy up. People tended to take my flat to sleep in when they had nowhere else to go, as I had a spare bedroom and a nice couch. I might not have been the best chef, but if someone needed a sofa to crash on, I was good with making breakfast for two. I changed into a black Papyrus t-shirt, bright yellow emoji pajama pants, and got into bed. I grabbed my laptop off the bedside table and opened Netflix. I needed to be at work early tomorrow, but a couple episodes of The Office wouldn’t kill me.

My dreams of adopting a corgi with Chris Hemsworth were interrupted by a loud beeping. I groaned, and hit ‘off’ on my alarm. I grabbed my glasses, as I didn’t feel like decapitating myself on the door frame today. I chose a black t-shirt and comfy black jeans and pulled them on. My clothing choices weren’t really important when it came to the coffee shop, people just ran in and out, making their way through their own busy lives, and that was fine. Working at the cafe was just so that I could have a flat to live in, and not so that I could steal plants to keep in said flat. I stuffed my keys into my back pocket, pulled on a jacket and left the house. The sky was a light gray in the chilly morning, and I was glad for my warm jumper. There were already five people in the shop when I walked up to the counter. Maybe they were students who had last minute projects to finish before school, early morning office workers looking for something to wake them up, people just coming off night shifts, or maybe people who were having a rough time at home and needed somewhere to get away. I exhaled a happy sigh. I tied an apron around my neck, combed a hand through my quiff to resettle it after putting my visor on, and pinned on my name tag. People filtered in and out, sometimes in higher capacities. The guy from the plant shop came in once, and I made sure to add just a little extra caramel to his macchiato. I knew his name for a blissful five minutes before it was wiped from my memory with the billions of other names I had to remember. I was cleaning the counters after closing when Jack called my name from the back of the shop.

“Phil! Louise texted you! Something about tea?” Jack explained, handing me my phone as I dashed out the back door.

“Thanks Jack!” I called over my shoulder as I quickly grabbed my jacket. It was Wednesday! How could I forget? A while ago, Louise and I had planned to meet up at her flat after work on Wednesdays. We both had busy schedules,(if you could call gaming and editing ‘busy’) and didn’t often have time to just sit and chat, which we both missed. So, that’s what Wednesdays were. Just a nice chat with a couple snacks and warm drinks. And now I was running late. When I had made it to her building and raced up the flights of stairs, feeling like my lungs wanted to eject themselves out of my body, to her apartment, Louise was cradling a paper bag filled with groceries and talking into her phone. Darcy was in a stroller nearby, and next to her was a bag similar to the one Louise was holding. As quietly as I could manage, I snuck over and grabbed the other bag. Louise hung up, an annoyed expression passing over her face.

“Sorry about that Phil. Apparently my editor dumbass and I had some things to tie up.” she gave me an apologetic smile. “Oh, you don’t need to carry those.”

I didn’t respond, I just smiled, whipped out my spare key and unlocked the door. With a grateful shake of her head, she pushed Darcy’s stroller into the flat and I set the bag on the table. I then walked into the kitchen and put the kettle on.

“Phil,” Louise sighed, but she knew there was no stopping me, so she took a seat on the sofa and waited. I knew Louise was incredibly busy a lot of the time, trying to balance work, a child, and most of the community we lived in, so I didn’t want her to stress over me, especially since I was one of the oldest of us. I grabbed a tin of biscuits, did up her tea the way she liked it, also grabbed my tea, and walked into the lounge. “Thanks,” she looked exhausted.

“Have you any gotten any sleep?” I asked, genuinely concerned.

Louise shook her head, “Not much, really. I mean, I’ve got a six month old and get random bouts of creativity at 3am, not much room for sleep.”

“I could take care of Darcy if you want,” I suggested.

“Aw, you’re sweet, but I don’t know if I’d trust you with Darcy without secondary supervision,” she laughed.

I giggled, “That’s probably a better decision,” I stirred the liquid in my cup, “So, anything new?” I took a big swig of the tea.

Louise opened her mouth to answer, but was interrupted by the sound of a door opening. I knew it was the guest room, but I couldn’t help but look up. The person I saw nearly made me choke on my tea. It was him! The guy from the flower shop! Except, instead of his galaxy shirt, he was in a an oversized black t-shirt, and skinny jeans of the same colour. He’d straightened his hair since I saw him last, and I briefly wondered why. The man hadn’t taken notice of me yet, so I just focused on my tea.

“Uh, hey Louise. I think I’m gonna head off now. My flat gets sold tomorrow, and I still have a couple boxes to move still, so,” he trailed off.

“Okay, see you later then. My flat is always available if you need to store stuff,” Louise told him.

“Uh, yeah.” he shifted uncomfortably, probably wanting to sat something, “Hey, um, about that, do you know about any hotels nearby? I need a place until I can get a job to get my own flat,”

“Oh, you can stay here Dan,” Louise assured. Right, that was his name. Dan.

“I know, but, there’s a bunch of people who use this space as well, and they know you a lot better, so I don’t want to take up room.” Dan explained.

“If you need a room, I’ve got a spare,” I interjected. Dan suddenly took notice of me, and a pink tinge rose in his cheeks.

“Oh yeah. Um, Dan, this is Phil,” Louise introduced. I gave him a small wave. “His flat’s in a different building, but everything around here’s pretty close together anyways,”

“Hey,” I smiled.

“Uh, h-hi,” he responded. Dan seemed to have lost his previous confidence.

“Do you want help with the boxes? I don’t have a car, but I’m free to help carry stuff,” I said. I didn’t exactly know why, but something was telling me that I needed to get to know this Dan guy. Probably something to do with the fact that my grandma was psychic. I did a tarot reading for a video once, and I got ‘The Knight of Wands’ and it had said that a guy will have a big impact on my life. Something about an energetic warrior or having a hasty personality. I wasn’t sure if that was Dan, but there was always a possibility. Dan and Louise shared a look like a mother telling her child to make friends on the first day of school.

“Um, I guess it’d be nice to have some help,” he said, finally, “T-Thanks sir-”

“Phil,” I finished, “Just call me Phil.”


End file.
